Pierre Thomas isn't looking for sympathy.
But the former NFL running back and Chicago area native says he does want justice - and the $700,000 and counting he estimates Illinois courts have said he is owed by the owners of Tennessee-based gym operator D1 Training.
And Thomas said he is hoping someone can step up to help him take to Tennessee courts a legal fight he already won in Illinois, and end an alleged corporate shell game.
Will Bartholomew
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"Other guys invested, and I'm not sure why their investments worked, and mine didn't," said Thomas. "But they did me dirty."
"And I just want to know: Where did my money go?"
For more than seven years, Thomas has been in court, trying to win back hundreds of thousands of dollars he believed he had invested in a new Chicago area athlete-focused training facility under the popular D1 Training brand.
For Thomas, the story begins with a business meeting in Chicago, as he neared the end of his professional football career.
For nine seasons, Thomas had played running back at the highest level of his sport.
That football career had begun at Thornton Fractional South High School in south suburban Lansing, where Thomas was a standout athlete. He then excelled at the University of Illinois, where he ranked 6th in the school's history for rushing yards.
He was signed as an undrafted free agent with the New Orleans Saints in 2007, and by 2009, was a key contributor to a Saints team that secured the franchise its only NFL title.
Thomas would eventually go on to play for the San Francisco 49ers and the team formerly known as the Washington Redskins, before he retired from football in 2015.
As he neared the end of his playing days, Thomas was looking ahead to what would come next. He said he always knew he wanted to give back, not only in the home region of the Saints, but also back in his home region, in and around Chicago.
With this in mind, he sought to launch the I CAN Foundation, an organization intended to help encourage physical fitness and combat obesity in youth, particularly those from lower income regions and households.
Thomas said it was with this goal in mind that he sat down with a representative of a company known as Sports Holding, to consider investing in a new gym and training facility that the company representative told him was going to be built in Chicago under the rising brand known as D1 Training.
The company was launched in the early 2000s by former University of Tennessee fullback Will Bartholomew. According to published reports, Bartholomew launched the business venture when injury ended his football career, just before he could have a chance at the NFL.
The company opened its first facility in Franklin, Tennessee, south of Nashville, offering a gym with sports-based programs, coaching personnel and fitness and training tools, specifically designed to help current and former athletes, like himself, attain sports and fitness goals.
By 2004, the business had turned profitable, according to a report published by CNBC. And in the years that followed, Bartholomew turned his efforts to planting more locations through the franchise business model around the country.
To help achieve that goal, Bartholomew recruited current and former professional athletes looking to invest.
D1 representatives did not reply to requests for comment from the Cook County Record.
According to its website, D1 now has more than 85 locations across the country, including three in Chicago's suburbs, one near Rockford and one in Merrillville, Indiana.
According its franchising website, D1 estimates franchise start-up costs of about $650,000.
In 2014, Thomas became one of those recruited by D1 to grab a share of a D1 franchise. Thomas said he agreed to pay $200,000 to a corporate entity known as D1 Chicago, which was legally known as D1/CAC West Loop Sports Training of Chicago LLC.
Thomas said he believed the money would be used to open a D1 gym in Chicago. And he said he was told he would be able to use that gym to offer low-cost or free physical fitness programs to underprivileged Chicago area youth through his foundation.
But in the months that followed, Thomas said it became apparent to him that D1 wasn't going to fulfill its promise to him, ultimately "ghosting" Thomas and his business representatives.
Then in April 2016, the D1 Chicago corporate entity in which Thomas had invested was dissolved by order of the Illinois Secretary of State.
In 2016, Thomas sued the company known as D1 Sports Holding LLC, demanding his money back.
Ultimately, courts sided with Thomas, finding D1 had violated Illinois state law by allegedly misleading Thomas into buying "something that did not yet exist."
In 2020, a Cook County judge ruled in favor of Thomas, ordering D1 to pay a total, at the time, of about $496,000, including refunding Thomas' $200,000, $127,000 in attorney fees and about $169,000 in interest.
D1 then also lost on appeal in 2022, when an Illinois appeals court in Chicago also agreed the contract should be rescinded and Thomas should be paid.
However, since then, Thomas said he still has not been paid, and D1 has continued to ignore his demands.
In filings since - and in an interview with The Cook County Record - Thomas has argued he believes D1 has engaged in a sort of corporate shell game, in part, in a bid to deny Illinois courts the power to force them to pay Thomas what Illinois courts had determined he was owed.
In this instance, Thomas and his lawyers have argued D1 has shifted assets among different corporate entities, or "shell corporations," as Thomas' lawyers have asserted.
In particular, one of Thomas' lawyers, Jon Hyun, of Chicago, said they have documents that allegedly show the corporation known as D1 Sports Holding - which Thomas successfully sued in Illinois court - "conveyed assets" to a different Tennessee corporation known as D1 Sports Parent LLC, or D1 Parent.
The documents also allegedly showed those assets were transferred without "adequate consideration" in return. Further, Hyun and Thomas noted the transfers were performed at the same time the state dissolved D1 Chicago, and mere weeks before Thomas filed suit.
Hyun said he could not provide those documents to The Cook County Record, as they were provided under discovery in court, and cannot be publicly disclosed.
After he won in Cook County court, Thomas sought an order from a judge allowing him to move against D1 Parent in Illinois court, in a move known as "piercing the corporate veil," to reveal who may be holding the assets.
However, a Cook County judge denied that request in 2021, finding Illinois courts lacked the jurisdiction to force Tennessee-based D1 Parent to be responsible for the ruling against its affiliate, D1 Sports Holding.
In all, Thomas estimates D1 owes him about $700,000 under the judgment, including updated attorney fees and interest.
Thomas acknowledged he could still take his case to Tennessee, and attempt to use that state's courts to enforce the Illinois judgment.
But he and Hyun estimated such a legal proceeding would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in attorney fees. And Thomas has not yet found an attorney willing to take the case to Tennessee on a contingency basis - meaning, the lawyer would only get paid from any judgment paid by D1.
Thomas said he is not certain he wants to foot the bill for more years in court out of pocket, as he focuses on other endeavors, including business ventures in real estate and carpentry, and work on his charitable foundation.
"This has been a headache for years," Thomas said. "I just don't understand how they can get away with taking money for something that they didn't do?"
"Where's the justice in that?"